Chocolate chips are awesome; enough said. They make milkshakes chunkier, granola bars more flavorful, and oatmeal sweeter. There can't remember a day in my life when I haven't incorporated chocolate into at least two of my meals. (I totally got that from my dad, who is at least as much of a chocoholic as I am.)

You might have noticed that there are limited vegan chocolate chips in grocery stores, and even fewer Fair Trade chips. That's why I became interested in making my own chocolate chips - so I would know exactly what's in them. It's nice to have some kept in the fridge for when I might want to sneak them into something I'm eating. After I came up with a good, stable recipe for homemade chocolate chips, I decided to try it out with of my unused squirt bottles. (I got them from a craft store.) It works well to make cute little droplets of chocolate that soon hardened into yummy chocolate chips.

As mentioned, I have used these adorable chocolate chips in milkshakes (like my new Mint Chocolate Chips Milkshake), oatmeal (like my Mexican Chocolate Oatmeal), and just for snacking on. They're fun to make and super rich in taste. I'm interested to hear how you choose to use your chocolate chips!

Homemade Chocolate Chips

Ingredients:

1/4 cup cocoa powder

1/4 cup of coconut oil

1 tablespoon of agave nectar (or an equivalent amount of another liquid sweetener)

Directions:

Melt the coconut oil. Stir in the cocoa powder and the agave. Put the mixture in an icing dispenser or another needle-tip device you can use to squirt little droplets of the mixture.

On a flat surface, lay out some wax paper. Squirt droplets of the chocolate mixture, then refrigerate it all for 1-2 hours.